SHAWNEE – Bo Overton's Bison women's basketball team will make the trek to Topeka, Kansas this week for two games. On Nov. 11, OBU faces Pittsburg State and will follow that up on the 12th against Washburn.
The contests are a part of the Washburn Crossover Classic. Tip-off against the Gorillas comes at 4 p.m. on Friday while the matchup with the Ichabods is slated for 3 p.m.
Fountain of Youth
With players departing due to graduation and the transfer portal, this Bison roster of 2022-23 is much different than a season ago. In fact, 10 of the 15 players on this year's team are either freshmen and sophomores. The leading returners in terms of games played are senior
Madison Chambers and sophomore
Jill Leslie. Chambers played in all 28 games last year with five starts while Leslie earned 12 starts in 28 games played. Among the seniors that OBU will have to lean on are
Melissa Southard,
Malou Savanna and
Erika Ankney. Their past experience will be vital for helping guide a young squad.
Who To Turn To
Gone from a year ago is 60 percent of the team's scoring. Mallory Lockhart, Jaylin Stapleton, Kalifa Ford and Andreja Peciuraite combined for 1,146 of the team's 1,897 points.
Jill Leslie is a strong candidate to help fill the void. Last year, she averaged 19.3 minutes per game and tallied 5.4 points and rebounds and made 48.5 percent from the field. Leslie is also a member of the OBU volleyball team and will join up with this Bison squad later. Questions will have to be answered after that, though. Of all the returners, the next-highest scorer following Leslie was
Kennedy Large who tallied 4.3 points per game in 2021-22.
Meet the Freshmen
Azariah Jackson,
Faith Wright,
Hannah Smith,
Sydney Duncan,
Kamdyn Graves and
Jaedyn Getman are donning the green and gold attire for the first time in 2022-23. One thing about this class is the collective size. Smith, Duncan, Graves and Getman all range from 5-foot-11 to 6-foot-2. Also of note, Getman, Duncan and Graves all left their respective high schools as career leaders in points scored. Plus, Wright, a product of Dale High School, left as a career 48-percent three-point shooter while Smith left Choctaw HS with a school-record 500 rebounds.
The OKC Connection
Last season, coach
Bo Overton had two of his former Oklahoma City University players – Mallory Lockhart and Payton Taylor – helping the Bison. That connection with Overton's former stomping grounds continues with the aforementioned
Erika Ankney, a point guard. Last season, Ankney was second on OCU with a 16.9 scoring average. Over her three years with the Stars, she averaged 12.6 points per game and hit a solid 40.1 percent (73-of-182) from downtown.
Running the Show
One of the key early-season storylines is who the Bison will turn to at the point guard position. The two previous years, Jaylin Stapleton occupied that spot heavily and ended leaving OBU with a 10.4 scoring average, 3.7 assists and the second-best career free throw percentage (85.3). Additionally, Lockhart and Taylor saw time running the 'one' a season ago. This time around, Ankney and Chambers are likely possible replacements for this year's squad. Stay tuned.
Time to Rise (Again)
The Great American Conference Preseason Poll was announced in early-October. In that release, the league's coaches slotted the green and gold in eighth, one spot ahead of where they were at in 2021-22 (9th). While one might think that's a negative, and in a sense, it is, OBU doesn't see it that way. And rightfully so. Despite a ninth-place preseason standing a year ago, the Bison pushed as high as third place at one point last season in the conference standings.
Road Warriors
How's this for an opening portion of your schedule: Five of the first six games for OBU will come away from home. That includes two games in Topeka, Kan., another in Tahlequah, Okla., one in Wichita Falls, Texas and the last in Weatherford at SWOSU. Since the program made the full-time jump to NCAA Division II and the GAC in 2015-16, this will be the first time the Bison play five of their first six contests outside of Shawnee.
Scouting Pittsburg State
Pittsburg State was picked to finish eighth in the MIAA Preseason Poll. The Gorillas return two starters and eight letterwinners from last year's team that went 16-13.
Coach Amanda Davied's team led the MIAA last year in field-goal percentage (45.7) and three-point percentage (36.2). The Gorillas did turn over the ball a fair bit, though, ranking 11th out of 14 teams (11.7 per game).
Fifth-year guard Tristan Gegg is the player to watch for the Gorillas. Last season, she was sixth in the MIAA in scoring (17.3 ppg), second in free-throw percentage (85.6) and led the league in three-point makes per game (2.2). Of note, Gegg, in the team's exhibition opener against Missouri-Kansas City on Oct. 30, scored a game-high 34 points.
Karenna Gerber ranked sixth in the MIAA last season with 1.1 blocks per game.
Scouting Washburn
Lora Westling, a former Ichabods great, was hired on April 13, 2022 after spending the previous six seasons at Western Colorado. During her playing days at Washburn, she helped lead the program to the 2005 NCAA Division II National Championship.
Last season, Washburn had a respectable defense, limiting opponents to 38.2 percent shooting. That mark was third-best in the MIAA.
Offensively, though, the Ichabods struggled. They were 11th in scoring offense (60 ppg); 10th in three-point field goal percentage (29.8) and 12th in free throw percentage (69%).
Senior forward Abby Oliver is Washburn's best returning player. Last season, she was ninth in the MIAA in blocks (30; 1.0 pg), reached double-figuring scoring 14 times including a career-best 20 vs. Emporia State and was an All-MIAA Honorable Mention selection.
